Goodbye My Dandelion
by Krazy Ky-Sta Hatter
Summary: Peeta's mind is gone and Katniss has a plan for revenge. But it will take her life in the process. Can she still go through with it when Peeta is returning little by little? And can she face how she truly feels?
1. Harder

**Harder**

I run to my room and jump onto the bed where I finally let the tears run down my face. I find myself shuddering as I truly realised what it meant.

When I had slammed the door it had bounced back and now stands ajar. I look up as I hear it creak. There he is, standing in the doorway looking at me with a mix of emotions. Though he mostly just seems confused.

I quickly wipe away the tears and try to tell him to go… but the words just won't come. It's like there is something blocking my throat. And it wasn't his hands this time.

Without waiting for my permission Peeta walks over to me and lies next to me on the bed. The shock of how similar this is to the nights on the train is painful. Especially as I look into his blue eyes. They are his eyes, but they're different now. They look at me more coldly, the love has gone. Yet as he speaks I can hear a trace of that old warmth.

"What's wrong?" he asks me. I look up at his face a moment before I answer.

"You," I tell him. He blinks rapidly and his brow furrows.

"Aside from the obvious, what have I done?"

"You're finally seeing me for me, who I truly am. I was always amazed that I didn't drive you away. It's what I normally do. You stood by me. But now… you just see me. Stubborn, selfish, arrogant, cold… and… well, you know the rest," I say quietly. As I say it out loud it begins to hurt again, even worse that when I said it in my head. Saying it out loud was just confirming it.

"Katniss you have more good points than you realise," he tells me. "I've always been able to see everything about you. The good and the bad. I saw just how good you are. But you're self-conscious and fragile so you cover it up with arrogance and a hard exterior. You had to raise your family when you were eleven and it changed you. You had to grow up fast and face the dangers most wouldn't. The only thing was that I could overlook your rough edges." He looked down at my confused face and it took a bit, but as always he understood me. "Not all of my memories were effected." I still just lie there looking at him. Then I sigh deeply and bury my face into his shirt.

"You weren't supposed to get better," I whisper. "I'm glad you are but now its just going to be harder."

"What will?" he says softly.

"My plan… I have a plan. The kind I don't tell anyone. It would have been simpler on me if you were just gone. And it would have been easier on you because you wouldn't even like me enough for it to hurt."

"This doesn't sound like a very good plan," he says. "Perhaps you should tell me what it is." I look back up at him and smile like it's a joke.

"Maybe later… when I can't go back." Peeta shakes his head in exasperation. He unwraps my arms from around him and gets off my bed. He turns back to me and cups my face in his hands.

"You know you left out extremely annoying," he says grinning. Quickly his hands drop and grip the edge of the bed. His knuckles go white and his eyes are scrunched as tight as he can. "I have to go," he hisses with his eyes still shut. He opens his eyes and looks at me. There is little warmth left. "I was lucky to get that much time," he says with a forced smile.

Then without looking back he strides from the room. And I am left on my bed, confused and empty.


	2. Dandelion

**Dandelion**

I look around in the darkness. No one stirs and the room is filled with deep slow breathing. Quietly I pick up my bow and arrow, check my Nightlock pill is in its pocket and sneak off. I leave my gun beside Peeta, I won't need it, but he will.

I'm just through into the next room when I hear the whisper.

"Katniss?" I turn to face Peeta, his face illuminated by a shaft of light from the window above us. In the moonlight I can clearly see the worry on his face. "Where are you going?"

"It's time for my plan, and you won't stop me" I say. My hand slips into my pocket subconsciously and I feel it brush against something small round and cool. "But first I have to give you something. You may not remember this right. But you gave this to me in the Quarter Quell," I walk up to him take his had and close it around the pearl. He looks at for a moment before surprise flickers across his face.

"This is the pearl I gave you?" I nod. "You kept it with you?"

"If I'm anywhere for more than a day it goes with me." He looks up from the pearl to me. Agony is in his eyes.

"Why are you doing this Katniss?" I look at the ground a while trying for find a way to tell him.

"Do you remember… after the bread… when I picked that dandelion? That was the moment I realised we were going to live. It was my hope. Seeing the dandelion in spring." I sigh. "But my dandelion was taken away from me. It was killed and broken beyond hope. It was Snow that did that… and now he has to pay. I lost my dandelion… and I was broken. I hurt those that I still had. I was under for weeks on end. I needed my dandelion but it was destroyed.

But then he started coming back. Bit by bit my dandelion was himself again." I sigh deeply again and put my head down against his chest, I hide my face in the fabric. Much like the last time I told him this. "You weren't supposed to get better. It's hard on me, hard on you. I was at least hopping I could do this while you still barely remembered me. But it's far too late for me" I still don't look up at Peeta and I have no idea what could be going through his head.

"I missed my dandelion." I take his arms from around me and hold them a second before I turn away without even another look at him. To look in his eyes no would make me break down. And I had to do this for him.

I begin to walk away but as I do Peeta grabs my wrist and pulls me back. His eyes are wide with fear.

"Why does this sound like a goodbye?"

"Because it is." I lean up and kiss him gently on the lips. "I love you Peeta," I say. Once again I turn to leave. I'm almost out of the next door when he speaks again.

"You would do anything to save me… Real or not real?" his voice is trembling. I pause without looking back.

"Real," I say.

"Then stay." I hear the metallic click and turn to find him pointing the gun I left at his head. For a moment I am frozen to the spot with shock then I slowly walk up to him and gently take the gun from his hand. He gives it up without a fight and his hand moves to cress my face.

I slowly lean up to him and his lips meet mine.

The gun clatters loudly to the floor as I kiss him. The same passion that took me in the cave and on the beach sweeps over me now. I push myself harder against him, my hand curling in his hair. His hand on my back presses me even closer. And the other hand tangles itself in my hair. I am lost in the kiss. And it feels good.

There is a cough behind us and we break apart to look at Gale. He leans in the doorway looking amused but I can see the hurt in his eyes.

"Having fun?" he asks sarcastically… there's a slight strain to his voice.

"I'm trying to stop her from committing suicide," Peeta tells him.

"Seems to be working," he says with a humourless laugh. "What was her plan?"

"Kill Snow, take Nightlock," I say. Both of them look at me in horror. "I told you it would have been easier if you were still gone," I tell Peeta.

"No!" Gail says forcefully. "We're not letting you go! Not alone anyway… and no suicide after."

"But-"

"Which is why we're coming with you," Peeta tells me.

I look from one to the other, the boys who hold my heart. By best friend and my dandelion. I knew I could do this.


	3. Deaths

**Deaths**

I look down at Peeta lying on the ground. Blood slowly pools out behind him. I look over at Snow, but it is not Snow who has done this.

"_You were meant to do this, but you failed… so now I will!"_ I heard the cold hard voice of Coin in my memory. I could see the lady with a gun pointed at my chest. Staring down the barrel time seemed to slow down.

It all made sense now. She had sent Peeta with us because she _wanted_ me to die. But she didn't want to be the one to do it… bad publicity to kill the Mockingjay. But now here, in a cameraless, windowless room with just her, Peeta, Gale and Snow, there was no one to see.

I watched as Coin pulled the trigger and waited for the impact of the bullet. Instead I found myself thrown on the ground and Peeta who was suddenly standing in my place was hit and fell to the ground.

Fast as anything I whipped out her bow and shot an arrow right into Coins head. And I watched as the leader of the rebellion fell dead to the ground.

Snow laughs, blood gurgles out of his mouth.

"Not what you thought she was eh?" he rasps. I don't time for this! I hold up the bow and shoot him too. Grimacing as I realise I've probably done him a favour.

Without another thought I rush to Peeta's side and kneel down. I begin to inspect the wound… hoping it isn't in a fatal place. He hasn't lost too much blood so things were looking okay so far.

"Hey," he says to me as he clutches my hand. Gale comes over and kneels beside him too.

"Hey mate," he says softly. "I thought we were meant to be stopping her from committing suicide… I don't think this really helps much." I glare up at him, tears blurring my vision, but Peeta just laughs weakly.

"I'd rather me than her. But it's up to you to stop her now."

"No!" I say firmly. "You're going to get through this."

Peeta smiles. "I've been shot."

"I got shot too!"

"Yes but you were wearing a bulletproof vest," he tells me calmly.

"No! I won't let you go!" I say stubbornly, shaking my head. "I'm not ready to say goodbye yet!" Peeta laughs painfully.

"This from the girl who was trying to say goodbye only a few hours ago?" he says. "Its okay, Katniss. You've got Gale to look after you. He loves you just as much as I do."

I'm horrified by what he's saying but it only makes me angrier.

"Don't you _dare_ give me away!" I yell. "You are not _allowed _to give me away and you are not _allowed_ to give up! Do you understand me! I will _not_ let you go!"

His eyes close and I shake him, panic running through me. I couldn't loose him!

"No Peeta! Stay with me!" I shriek. His eyelids flutter and I keep trying to wake him. But I am dragged away as soldiers come in.

They notice three things first.

1: Peeta, lying injured on the ground. They pick him up and carry him out.

2: Snow, lying dead on the ground, my arrow in his chest. There is a small cheer. But they fade when they see the next thing…

3: Coin, lying dead on the ground, _my_ arrow in her head…

The last thing I noticed was a loud boom that shook the foundations of the building. Gale sat up straight and his face paled.

"Oh no!" he whispered. Then there was another boom and I fell on the ground.

The soldiers drag me out roughly and lock me in a room somewhere that's familiar but I don't care to identify.

I can only think of one thing.

Peeta.


	4. Damage

**Damage**

I don't know how long I was up in the room I slowly recognised as the suite where we'd stayed during the games. Food would appear along with new outfits.

No one came to visit. No one told me if Peeta was okay or if he had died.

Eventually I lost track of everything. My mind was numb. I walked around doing meaningless things. And one day I found myself singing. Once I started I just couldn't stop. It was as if I had busted a damn. But all the songs, I sung for Peeta. He was always there in the back of my mind.

But still no one comes. A thought forms itself in my head and I can't block it out.

Peeta is dead. Peeta is dead and I would eventually, when they bloody well got their asses into gear and finished the trials, would be executed. If Peeta was dead then I guess it didn't seem too bad. But I hated it that my death would be their privilege to take yet again. As I looked around I saw that there was _nothing_ for me to kill myself with.

To me, no matter what happened, death was the best option here.

What else did I have to live for? My mother and Prim? There would come a time when they wouldn't need me. And who would want a sister or a daughter like me anyway. They would be ashamed… I was the girl who killed the new President of Panem.

It occurred to me that I was probably half insane at this point.

I had lost count of the days when Haymitch walked into my room.

"Come on, your trials over. Time to go home." He led the way out.

"So I'm not being executed?" I ask following him.

"Ha! You wish!" he laughs.

"Yes I do," I mutter and he looks at me sharply. "Is Peeta alive?" I ask as he loads me onto a helicopter. He doesn't reply.

Instead I am met by an overjoyed Plutarch.

"Katniss!" he cries. "I expect you want to know everything that happened." I don't really but that doesn't stop him from telling me anyway.

He tells me how after I shot Coin and Snow, Paylor had taken over as president. Gale had told everyone I had acted in self defence shooting Coin. But not may people other than my loyal supporters believed him. But after much searching they had found a hidden camera in the room which proved my 'innocence'.

When you had killed as many as I had, there was no such thing as innocence anymore.

He told me everything… everything but the one thing I actually wanted to hear. He didn't say one word about Peeta.

But I was quickly taken off that thought with what he told me next.

The two loud bangs I had heard were explosions. A trap of sorts that had killed many Capitol children. And when the first bomb went off others had come in to help… including my sister… then another set went off.

Prim was dead.

I was numb. I was only vaguely aware of the tears running down my cheeks. I know that trap, I had heard Gale talking about it. This was his fault… well it was Coins, but it was still his idea. I would never forget that.

We arrive at District 12 which makes no sense to me since it was destroyed. But they lead me down to the only houses left standing. The Victor's Village. There waiting for me is an alive, healthy looking Peeta.

I run and throw myself into his arms.

I was going to be hard. I was damaged and mostly broken. It would take years to get over the damage the Capitol, the rebellion, the war had done to me… and to him.

We still had a very, very long way to go. But we would get there eventually… together.


End file.
